All the Reviews

Being a bit of a sucker for a strong sense of place, and culture I was intrigued by the Makana series, and lucky enough to get the second book - DOGSTAR RISING for review. But this seemed to me to be a series that should begin at the very beginning, so I shouted myself the first book, THE GOLDEN SCALES.

In terms of sense of place, and the society in which the book is set, it was extremely well done. The ancient city of Cairo is not just the backdrop for the story, it inhabits the action. There's a physical feeling of the souks, and alleys, the dark corners in which the ... Read review

I'd never heard of the death of Carolyn Matthews until I found out about Derek Pedley's book DEAD BY FRIDAY. In one way, I wish I still hadn't as this has to be, without a doubt, one of the most pointless, selfish, stupid, idiotic, inexplicable and flat out unbelievable crimes from a city that seems to specialise in them. In another, it's been a succinct reminder for a reader of a lot of fictional crime that real life can beat the fictional for weirdness hands down.

(DISCLAIMER: I did generate the ebook version of this manuscript for Derek Pedley, with no obligation ... Read review

THIS REVIEW Written by Chloe:  10 years old  note:  Chloe kindly agreed to read this book and write a review for me.

The book is about a young girl who becomes a fabulous spylet. I didn't like the book at the beginning but then I liked it when Janey Brown became Jane Blonde, a sensational spylet. The story could not really happen but it was easy to follow the plot and it was very entertaining because the story bulit to a climax. There was a great ending to the story. It was also very hard to put the book down. I got into trouble once when I was reading under the covers at ... Read review

At this time of the year for some reason, goodness knows what, I crave dark, violent, humorous escapism. I crave pulp, noir, hardboiled, I'll even happily take nasty. THE COLOMBIAN MULE delivered exactly what I was looking for.

It doesn't hurt that this isn't a police procedural, a stereotypical lone wolf private detective or any of the expected scenarios as well. Instead we do have a PI, who works with a group of old friends, to solve problems. In this case, the problem is why one man seems to have been set up to take the fall as the recipient of drugs smuggled in by a ... Read review

DEADLY CODE is the 3rd book in the Dr Rhona Macleod series, a series, which up until now I've really enjoyed, but for some reason this one didn't work. Mind you, terrific sense of place, very atmospheric what with Macleod off in the remote Scottish Isles battling the evil menace of a cult of Scottish extremists. Or I think that's what they were. The big problem was that the plot was a bit too silly at points. Not that the idea of extremists of any kind is a bad concept, but not where there needs to be so much coincidence and frankly, a whole heap of heavy lifting to get Macleod into ... Read review

After reading Dugdall's first book THE WOMAN BEFORE ME I was kind of expecting something a bit wow from THE SACRIFICIAL MAN. Which it delivered in that sort of sock removing, what the, oh boy, cook your own dinner I'm reading, kind of way.

Mind you, it's a bit on the sneaky side. The story starts out with Cate Austin out of the prison system, working her first new assignment which is a sentencing recommendation for Alice Mariani. As explained in the blurb, Mariani helped her lover to die, and she is dealing with the consequences of that on a legal and a personal level. ... Read review

Buried in the darkest corners, or glittering away in the brightest hotspots there are bits and pieces of everyone's Australia being scribbled down on the back of beer mats, place mats, table cloths and menu cards. There are people writing great dollops of city based, mean gritty, and bright clean suburban streets based fiction. There are people out here in the hot, dry bits - Greater Australia as we all like to think of it - that are sitting in pubs, coffee shops and on the sides of dusty gravel roads weaving tales that are filled with a sense of who, what and where we all come from ... Read review

Sometimes I wonder if a book gets filed under "will get around to that" because of some sort of subconscious reaction to the blurb. I'm going with that. Makes me feel somewhat less daft than if I confessed that I put THE SILVER DAGGER down on a stack of unread books and then promptly forgot about it. It's not age, just poor stack management... really.

Anyway, the rediscovery of this book did give me a little pause for thought.

"Robert Carrana doesn't have much pity and he certainly has no compassion. What he does have is a passion for vengeance, a brutal heart ... Read review

There's a Renault Twingo referred to as having "committed suicide" when Gallo, the station's driver, he of the "Indianapolis Complex", slams into it in a spectacular example of mad driving that had me crying with laughter on page 4 of VOICE OF THE VIOLIN. Which is not a bad writing feat at all, in 4 pages you know that Montalbano's in a mood after a fabulous meal was interrupted by his nemesis Catarella. That his car's in the shop and he has to get to a funeral. That Gallo's a madman, and there's now a green Renault Twingo parked on the side of the road that's now got a smashed rear ... Read review